Category: Goals

Never Quit on Yourself

by chuckfasnacht, posted in entrepreneur, franchising, Goals, goalsetting, leadership, lifelong learner, startup

Never consider giving up on a worthwhile goal. The only way you will fail at achieving a goal is to quit. If you continue to hold your goal in mind and continue to work and evolve toward achievement of that goal, you will progress toward the ultimate achievement. A short-term failure or mistake is merely an educational lesson, and you will find that as you get more experienced and better at setting and achieving your goals, your educational lessons will become more and more expensive.

I remember the first time I lost $500 in an investment I was crushed! Then a couple years later, I learned a valuable lesson through making a $5,000 mistake. Years later, I again learned what NOT to do and lost $50,000 in one day! But each time I lost, I learned something that took me closer to more achievements and bigger numbers in income.

Making mistakes taught me how to identify red flags so I can hopefully prevent that mistake from happening again. Every time I recovered from the lesson learned, I more than made up for it on future efforts. I don’t fear making a mistake or losing because I compare it to the cost of a college education. I know the lessons I learn when I make a mistake will provide me strength and insight to achieve even greater successes. And creating and achieving more success will enable us to be a blessing to others!

Do well and be a blessing!

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Why WOULD they?

by chuckfasnacht, posted in entrepreneur, franchising, Goals, goalsetting, leadership, lifelong learner, startup

Selling Is Merely Helping Someone Do What They Want to Do!

Why would someone want to buy anything? If it is a thing, what will that thing help them do or be? People don’t buy a drill or other tool because they want the tool as much as what they want the tool to do for them. In the case of an electric drill, the buyer wants to make a hole!

If what you’re selling is a service, what will that service provide as a benefit to the buyer? And most importantly, why now, and why should they buy from you and not someone else? An excellent way to think about the career of sales is to think about it as a job to help people get something that they want, or maybe help them understand the benefit of something they didn’t know they wanted.

I remember a sales coaching situation with a salesman who was discouraged and struggling. In context, this same salesperson had great success early in his career and now found himself unsure of himself, and getting more no than yes. Getting a yes or a no is many times a function of timing, connecting on key needs and because it will provide a feeling or outcome the prospect desires. If we just consider the selling ratios and compare calls to closed sales, in this case the closing ratios were high early which gave a false impression to the salesperson. The compensation for early success is when the “no sale calls” begin to catch up later.

We were calling on a prospect that had already said no to the opportunity we were presenting. These are some of my favorite calls, because most of the time the prospect has already let there defensive walls down, because we acknowledge the no. Our goal is to have an open and honest discussion.

During the planning phase I asked the salesperson “why would the prospect want to buy our service?” to which they responded “he doesn’t want to buy, he already said no!” But “Why WOULD he want to buy?” After several iterations of this question the point was getting through. What outcome would having our service provide for the prospect that the prospect would understand could help them achieve some of their personal and professional goals. It wasn’t about our service as much as it was about how our service would help them achieve a goal they already were struggling to achieve.

In our call we started with “I know you are not interested in our service, but was hoping you could help us understand what we could present differently in the future.” Upon discussion, we learned more about the current state of operations and the struggles that the management team was having to cover all their responsiblities. As the prospect declared his lack of manpower to do current assignments he pointed out that another assignment would just make it worse. Need identified.

Apologetically, we missed the need. It was clearly our mistake for not understanding the customer and tailoring the presentation to show how our service (1) pay for the manpower to convert to the new systems, and (2) create additional savings for adding even more manpower. Through alignment of systems and processes, reducing some of the fixed costs, and increasing the output of the existing team, the service would help the management team achieve their goals quicker and more completely.

It won’t work for every time or every person, but understanding why a prospect “would want to buy” will be a big step toward creating a mutual win-win solution. Listen to the prospect and they will tell you what you need to know! Why they would want to buy!

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When in Doubt, Be Patient

by chuckfasnacht, posted in entrepreneur, franchising, Goals, goalsetting, leadership, lifelong learner, startup

When change happens or when you want change to happen, be patient. In time the dust will settle, and your doubts will either clear up and vanish or they will be borne out by your continued efforts during the waiting, working, and watching period. This doesn’t mean you should quit working at your goal or quit trying, but keep pedaling the bicycle and keep working toward making progress. By being patient, you will eventually have enough of the necessary facts and you will know it’s time to decide. Then do the next right thing! You wont have to make a hasty decision, but when it is time for action use the wisdom of Teddy Roosevelt who said,

“In any moment of decision, the best thing to do is the right thing, the worst thing to do is nothing.” —Theodore Roosevelt

Because you are thinking big, you may find that as you progress toward achievement of a goal, you find out new information. It is okay to adjust your goals after you set them if you find out new information. This isn’t intended to let you off the hook of a big goal, but it will help you identify nuances and minor direction changes as you develop your future. An example is an airplane flying from New York City to Dallas may start off with a compass heading. As the flight continues, there will be forces on the airplane that will cause a need to change the direction of the flight. These changes don’t require the plane to turn around and start over, but they will require that there be some fine-tuning on the heading the pilot selects to continue progressing toward the goal. When the plane safely touches down, it will be a result of paying attention to the external forces, weather, and winds that became part of the trip. Likewise, as you progress toward your goals, you will make fine-tuning adjustments to make sure the final outcome is the one you have in your vision.

Set a big goal and make progress toward it daily!

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Overcoming a plateau

by chuckfasnacht, posted in entrepreneur, franchising, Goals, goalsetting, leadership, lifelong learner

When you think about what you want to do, remember that good enough isn’t good enough. What do I mean by that or what is another way to say it? Good is the enemy of the best. As you determine the direction and the goals you want to set, don’t be afraid to think of what you would want to do if you KNEW YOU COULDN’T FAIL. What would your goal be then? Because the truth is that whatever goal you set and fix your mind on, you will eventually achieve. Earl Nightingale said, “whatever the mind can conceive and believe, with certainty it will be achieved.”

How will this apply to your situation? If you have an expectation, or self image, your performance will equal that image. People perform to the level they feel comfortable. If they expect to earn $100,000 per year, they will find ways to not exceed their comfort level. Self-sabotage can take the form of oversleeping, missing appointments, or generally not being focused on the customer. Likewise, performing below your comfort level will cause you to become laser sharp to find ways to achieve your level of comfort. So how do you break through into a new “best” for yourself?

Imagine setting your goals like setting a thermostat. When you are performing below your acceptable range the heat will kick on, and when you get too high, the cooling will calm you down. So changing the way you see yourself, and see your outcomes is the first step to sustainable growth.

There are two major ways to overcome these personal limitations through (1) developing habits that will no longer require active conscious planning and thought, and (2) using helpers to sprint alongside you to pace yourself for a larger goal.

Developing habits so your mind is free to expand into new areas of thought and personal development should be a first step. Anything that you do on a routine basis can be put into a habit, or scheduled in your personal planner. If you want it to be a habit, make it a routine you can schedule and stop thinking about. This could be a much longer discussion but for now lets set it aside and move to the next level of breaking through your plateau.

The example of Roger Bannister breaking the 4 minute mile is a good example of the sprinting concept. The four minute mile was mythically elusive and many people of the day thought it to be “scientifically impossible” because of the mechanical structure of humankind. It surely was a psychological barrier but it WAS possible to run a quarter mile in under a minute, and a half-mile in less than a two minutes. With his attention to training and thinking about how to break the record, Roger Bannister found 2 people who could run alongside him and pace him. He was able to break the “impossible” 4 minute barrier on May 6th, 1954. A short six weeks later the record was broken again by another, and today there are hundreds of people who have run the mile in under 4 minutes with the record time currently under 3 minutes and 44 seconds.

If you have a big goal that requires you to do something that you have never done before, consider finding short sprints that ARE possible and believeable, and begin to string them together. You too, along with people who can partner with you and run alongside, can do something that you once thought impossible.

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Where you look you will go

by chuckfasnacht, posted in entrepreneur, franchising, Goals, goalsetting, leadership, lifelong learner, startup, startup

Recently, I received accident avoidance training, which I recommend by the way. In this training event, the teacher was a race car driver, and he said when you are in a spin or if you feel like you are about to lose control always “look where you want the car to go.” He used examples of NOT looking at the ground, or NOT looking straight ahead in a turn. In the case of driving a race car or avoiding an accident, it is important to NOT be looking at the other cars.

The example the trainer used that was the most profound for me was that of a field with a tree in the middle of it. If you were driving through a field and you looked at a tree, saying, “I have to miss the tree…I have to miss the tree…” the premise is that you would indeed draw closer and closer to the tree until you hit it! By looking where you DON’T want to go, your eyes will draw your hands to a position that will create movement in the direction of your gaze.

Conversely, when you want to avoid an obstacle, it is important to look where you want to go. It works when you are going through a turn, and it works for when you want to avoid an accident. It works because our body follows the direction of our focused attention. Whether you are riding a bicycle, a motorcycle, or driving a race car, Look where you want to go!

What a fantastic analogy to goal setting!

If you have read other personal achievement books, you will recognize that we humans have a reticular activating system that will cause us to gravitate toward the focus of our attention. If we are focused on successfully completing the writing of a book, we will find ways and ideas to help us along that path. Likewise, if your goal is to generate more impact with your chosen work or talents, such as a self-directed business, your mind will work to find a way to help you achieve the goals you focus on. Regarding the way our brain works while goal setting, your body will try to create that which the mind is focused upon.

Choose your focus!

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